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— <;^C 



FALLING IN HARNESS. 



SKETCH OF THE LIFE 



REV. JOHN W. BARTON. 



IJi 

BY \^p,Mo.ij 

CHAPLAIN H. CLAY TEU1IBULL. 



V 



PHILADELPHIA: & 
AMERICAN SUNDAY-SCHOOL UNION, 

No. 1122 Chestnut Street. 



NEW YORK: 599 BROADWAY. 







Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1867, by the 

AMERICAN SUNDAY-SCHOOL UNION, 

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for 
the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. 



/ 










NOTE. 



This story of the struggle, through depend- 
ent orphanage and with weakness of body, 
of a brave and trustful boy, whose greatest 
ambition was to preach the gospel and win 
souls, and who succeeded in his life-work, 
offers encouragement to many whose desire it 
is to live to a purpose in spite of seeming 
obstacles to their usefulness. Moreover, its 
incidents of Sunday-school missionary service 
in Connecticut, Massachusetts and Pennsyl- 
vania indicate the need and value of such 
work as was his among the little ones of even 
the more favoured of our states, and will have 
a personal interest to many who knew him in 
those fields of labour, or who were earlier his 
companions in academy, college or seminary 
in the days of his toilsome student-life. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

Homeward Bound 7 

Parentage — Orphanage — School-Days . . 9 

Life at Williston Seminary . . . . 12 

Working his Way 14 

Enters Yale 16 

First Mission- Work 18 

Eestlessness for Souls 20 

Again in the Mission Field . . . .24 

Canvass of Western Massachusetts . 28 

New Sunday-Schools — Their Growth . . 31 

Prejudice Encountered — Progress Made . 35 

Value of his Work 39 

Travail of Soul for the Unevangelized . 41 

Yale Theological Seminary . . . .43 
1* 5 



6 CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

Mission- Work in Pennsylvania ... 46 

Home Heathenism 49 

Kesults of Effort 55 

Tireless Activity for Christ . . . .59 
New Mission Work in Massachusetts . . 62 

Tires out his Horse 64 

Disclosures by the Massachusetts Canvass 66 
" His Works do follow Him" . . . .72 

Zeal beyond Strength 73 

Ministerial Ordination 75 

The Accomplished Purpose .... 78 



SKETCH OF THE LIFE 



OF 



REV. JOHN W. BARTON. 



* HOMEWAKD BOUND. 

On the noon-train out from New York, 
on the New Haven road, November 21, 
1866, the passengers were startled by the 
announcement of a death in the ears. A 
young man who, although evidently far 
gone with consumption, had stepped on 
to the train unaided, had failed rapidly, 
and, in spite of every effort to resuscitate 
him, had quietly breathed his last, ' ' without 
a struggle or a pain, without even a fond 



8 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

good-by" to the loving wife who minis- 
tered to him in tenderness and sought 
vainly to secure one more word before his 
lips were forever mute. 

There was no lack of sympathy on the 
part of those who were strangers to the 
young man and to those who watched him 
lovingly. Ready hands were outstretched 
to aid in chafing the stiffening limbs, and 
in wiping the death-damp from the chill- 
ing brow. The kind-hearted conductor de- 
layed the train at one station and another, 
that cool water might be brought to slake 
the thirst of the dying one. And when the 
object of all this anxious care was beyond 
every human help, gentle words of inter- 
est in the mourning group were whispered 
from one to another of the lookers-on; 
and then through the crowded train there 
was a hush of solemn stillness, as if each 
had lost a friend, and there was sadness 



EEV. JOHN TV. BARTON. V 

thenceforward until, at the Stratford sta- 
tion, the remains of the suddenly deceased 
were lifted with reverent hand and borne 
towards the home of the attendant group. 
But among all the sympathizing pas- 
sengers on that car which death had en- 
tered, not one, outside the circle of imme- 
diate mourners, knew how useful a life 
had there closed, or understood what 
cause for sadness to many there was in 
this abrupt termination of the earthly 
service for Christ of Rev. John Wait 
Barton. 

parentage — orphanage school-days. 

He who died thus was born at Dan- 
bury, Connecticut, June 2, 1839, of pious 
parents, who consecrated him heartily to 
God. His mother dying while he was 
yet but a year old, he lived for a few years 
in New York City with his father, who 



10 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

was an officer in the Collegiate Church, 
Carmine Street. At seven years of age 
he returned, a poor orphan, to Danbury, to 
reside with his grandparents. 

He early showed independence of cha- 
racter, and strength of purpose for any 
object on which he set his mind. Not- 
withstanding his straitened circumstances, 
he resolved to have an education ; and, 
while very young, he commenced study 
with determination and enthusiasm. At 
ten, he took part in a village debating-, 
society, formed of his older schoolmates 
and young men, and others in the prime 
of life. " Nothing daunted by their age 
and experience, he entered the contest 
with such will and energy, and displayed 
such tact and discretion in argument, as 
to astonish his hearers." 

In the winter of 1853-4 he was in the 
Danbury Academy, under Professor Cyrus 



EEV. JOHN W. BAKTON. 11 

W. Northrop, now of Yale College, who 
says of him: " None of my pupils 
awakened a deeper interest in me, or 
made a more favourable impression on 
me, than young Barton. He was at that 
time very ambitious, eager to excel, and 
ready to do any amount of work in order 
to succeed. At my suggestion he began 
to study Latin, with a dim prospect that 
he might one day go to college. In the 
few weeks during which he studied under 
me, he made truly wonderful progress, 
carrying forward three leading studies in 
the first class, besides his Latin. In this 
he was far advanced in the Latin reader 
before spring, and so thoroughly versed 
in the grammar as to be able to advance 
in his translations at the rate of nearly 
two pages a day. He also excelled in 
declamation and writing. On leaving, I 
suggested East Hampton to him as a 



12 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

proper place to pursue his studies. He 
went there and fitted for college.'' 

LIFE AT WILLISTON SEMINAEY. 

At fifteen years old, he entered Willis- 
ton Seminary, with little other means of 
support than are possessed by every able- 
bodied youth ; and bravely he continued 
his struggle upward. 

Rev. George A. Pelton, now a pastor in 
Franklin, Mass., became Barton's inti- 
mate friend at East Hampton, and thus 
writes of their early intercourse : — 

" My acquaintance with Barton began 
in December, 1854. We were classmates 
at Williston, and my attention was at- 
tracted by his smart independence on the 
one hand, and his limited resources on 
the other, as indicated by an outgrown 
roundabout and short pantaloons, with 
boots run down at the heel, and a low- 



REV. JOHN W. BAKTON. 13 

crowned, soft hat coming well down over 
his rounded shoulders. I was rather drawn 
to him from the first, although several 
years his senior. Early in the new year 
1855, I called at his room one evening to 
speak with him religiously. Inquiring, I 
was told by him of his orphanage and cir- 
cumstances, and of his purposes of study. 
I think he had college education in view, 
and the law. I spoke to him of our 
heavenly Father, and his need of such a 
friend, and urged him to give his heart to 
Christ. I think he had been thoughtful 
somewhat before ; and I recall the in- 
creasing interest I felt in him as he 
listened and wept. Not long after, he, 
with others, gave decided evidence of con- 
version, and entered gradually upon per- 
sonal efforts for others' salvation." 

Barton connected himself with the Pay- 
son Congregational Church in East Hamp- 



14 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

ton, under the ministry of his former Dan- 
bury pastor, Rev. R. S. Stone. From that 
time a new ambition possessed him, and 
his desire to preach Christ and win souls 
seemed absorbing and inspiring. 

WOEKING HIS WAY. 

His student-life was one of toil and 
self-denial. As illustrating his patient dili- 
gence to secure the means of tuition and 
support, one of his comrades states that 
he acted as janitor for a literary society at 
the seminary, opening and closing the 
rooms, cleaning the lamps, and keeping 
every thing in order for weekly meetings, 
during the forty weeks of school session, 
for the trifling sum of seven dollars per 
annum. His friend Pelton adds: "We 
were in partnership in almost every thing, 
— boarding ourselves together, at less than 
a dollar per week each, sawing and split- 



KEV. JOHN W. BABTON. 15 

ting wood about the village and at the 
seminary wood-yard, spending most of the 
vacations at the seminary in similar occu- 
pation, besides cleaning the buildings, — at 
times enlivening the monotbny of vaca- 
tion-work by one reading ' Widow Be- 
dott Papers ' while the other ate his bread- 
and-molasses and cold baked beans as 
vacation extras, and both laughed with 
hearty good cheer. The last year he had 
care of one of the buildings, of the fires, 
and sweeping and bell-ringing ; while I 
had the other to care for. By such labours 
in vacations, half Wednesdays and Satur- 
days, and daily, with tuition remitted, and 
but little money, he squeezed through 
Williston Seminary/' 

It will be believed that, while "he 
entered the seminary as an ambitious 
student, and desired to be faithful at 
his studies, hard work and care for his 



16 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

maintenance hindered him in no small 
degree. M 

Yet he sustained himself well in his 
classes; while he commended himself to 
all as a mellow, genial Christian, zealous 
for his Divine Master, and cheerful in 
that Master's service. 

EN TEES YALE. 

In the fall of 1857, he entered the 
Freshman class of Yale College, to strug- 
gle through a course there, as at Williston. 
Prom the American and the Connecticut 
Education Societies he had some assist- 
ance at college, with an occasional dona- 
tion from the Sunday-school of the First 
Congregational Church at Danbury ; but 
his life was still one of privation, and 
there can be little doubt that his constitu- 
tion was undermined and his health im- 
paired by over- work and scanty fare. 



EEV. JOHN W. BARTON. 17 

" I have at times pitied the dear fellow,' ' 
says Pelton, " about his work when student 
companions were recreating, especially on 
a hot Wednesday or Saturday afternoon 
in June, sawing and splitting large, dry 
wood, at ten cents an hour, till nearly ex- 
hausted, and that while boarding himself. 
But I have often been cheered in my own 
despondency by his familiar ' Cheer up, 
old fellow! Don't get the blues. You 
and I have both seen dark days, pecuni- 
arily ; but we have never been forsaken/ 
His faith and prayers and fervent piety 
have often encouraged my own Christian 
hope and life, — so much so that I feel 
thankful to God for the providence which 
made us such early and lasting friends. 

" During college life I think his piety 

deepened and enriched steadily. He was 

made corresponding secretary of the Yale 

Missionary Society, when we were trying 
2* 



18 SKETCH OF THE. LIFE OF 

to give greater efficiency to its operations ; 
and he entered into that work with the 
same spirit, and manifested the same com- 
prehensive views, that he afterwards 
showed in home evangelization and Sab- 
bath-school work. * * * * 

"And thus was shown something of the 
man in the boy, and more of the earnest 
man in the youth, amid struggles with 
weakness of body and pecuniary embar- 
rassment to fit himself — or be fitted by 
various disciplines — to be a preacher of 
salvation, which from his conversion was 
his one ambition." 

FIRST MISSION WORK. 

In the spring of 1860, Rev. Leonard 
Woolsey Bacon, of the " Home Evangeli- 
zation Committee of the Congregational 
General Association of Connecticut/' sent 
out a number of Yale students to canvass 



REV. JOHN W. BAKTON. 19 

certain designated fields and obtain sta- 
tistics of religious destitutions. Barton 
was one of these workers ; and when his 
reports came in they showed such system 
and appreciativeness on his part, in the 
labour to which he had been called, as to 
attract Mr. Bacon's special attention. His 
maps of the canvassed towns were neatly 
and accurately drawn ; his statistical tables 
were complete ; and his comments on what 
he found noteworthy were shrewd and 
telling. The manner in which he per- 
formed this duty led to his future em- 
ployment in similar and more extensive 
labours. 

Gradually his health gave way under his 
hard study, hard outside work, and low 
diet ; and when only two terms remained 
of his college course, he was reluctantly 
compelled to cease study, and go on to a 
farm with friends in South-East, Putnam 



20 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

county, New York, in the hope of repair- 
ing his strength in out-door occupation. 
"It was a severe trial," writes Pelton, 
" both to himself and to his Christian 
classmates, that he must leave, — as he did, 
at the urgent counsel of his physician." 

RESTLESSNESS FOR SOULS. 

His interest in the religious affairs of 
college continued long after he left it. 

11 Three months later, he wrote : ' On the 
day of prayer for colleges the subject was 
remembered in our prayer-meeting at 
South-East ; and, oh, how my heart trem- 
bled with joy, a day or two after, to get 
your letter speaking of the seeming inter- 
est and of the prospect of a revival in 
college ! But how my hopes were all dashed 
by your letter since, stating a relapse since 
the day of prayer into the old state of 
coldness and indifference ! Oh, how my 



REV. JOHN W. BARTON. 21 

heart has bled and ached for you all since 
I left! If you all could see it from my 
stand-point, you could not rest a moment. 
You indeed have my prayers.' ' 

It was hardly an exaggeration for him 
to say he " could not rest a moment ;" for 
he was never really idle. Even while 
recruiting his health in a quiet country 
home, he found much to do for Christ. 
Taking hold of the village Sabbath-school, 
as its superintendent, he greatly increased 
its numbers and interest ; and in public 
and private he laboured for souls. Writing 
to his friend of one Sabbath's work, he 
said : — 

" It was the day of ' Monthly Exer- 
cises/ — a special service of the Sabbath- 
school : so I was talking nearly all the 
time. At the close, the minister, sick, 
wished me to conduct the church-services 
of the morning. In the afternoon I went 



22 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

to M , two miles out, and organized a 

Sabbath-school of which I had been ap- 
pointed superintendent. And in the even- 
ing I went to a prayer-meeting. Excite- 
ment kept < me up till through the day; 
and then I was exhausted, physically and 
mentally/ ' 

Then, with prophetic ken of his brief 
life of action here, he added, "I expect 
that will be the way every Sabbath when 
I get to preaching. I don't expect to see 
more than five years of effective service 
in the cause. I shall wear out in that 
time." Those five years were barely 
passed when he entered into rest. " But 
I shall work w T hile I live (God willing); 
and the prospect of wearing out and dying 
in work for souls is pleasant to me. I 
feel more and more every day that I was 
born to love and work for souls, and I 
hope I may never be found in any other 



EEV. JOHN W. BARTON. 23 

employment. I feel more and more 
every day that I do not belong to myself, 
— that I am not myself, but that God is 
working by me, speaking through me, 
whenever I try in any way to do good." 

Again, showing how the love of souls 
possessed him, sleeping and waking, he 
wrote: "I had a dream last night, — not 
exactly a dream, either; for I was about 
half awake. I was on my death-bed. I 
sent for you, and you came. You sat 
down with the catalogue and read me the 
names of our classmates ; and to many 
of them I sent some particular word, while 
to all I sent my dying message : — ' Dear 
classmates, meet me in heaven.' I 
thought then my Sunday-school visited 
me in a body, and I took each one by the 
hand, giving each a parting word and 
bidding them all to meet me in heaven. 
When, in speaking to the Sunday-school 



24 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

by turn, I came to one, I pressed his hand 
closely, and said, 'Dear Eddy, do, do 
meet me in heaven P at the same time 
endeavouring to put my arm around his 
neck, which effort aroused me from my 
stupor, — my dreaming state, — and my 
eyes were full of tears. How near to 
reality imagination does often come ! 

"I have often thought, 7 ' he added, on 
telling the dream, " how I shall feel, and 
what I should do, on my dying-bed. I 
feel as though then I should want to do 
all I had left undone ; that I should want 
to warn every person I ever knew to flee 
to Christ. Yet this thought of death 
never excites any pain, but rather plea- 
sure." 

AGAIN IN THE MISSION FIELD. 

Barton did not remain long at his farm- 
work. He was selected, in the fall of 



KEV. JOHN W. BARTON. 25 

1861, by the Evangelization Committee 
which he had already served, as their first 
lay missionary, having assigned to him a 
field in eastern Fairfield county. He did 
good service there, although he was too 
active in endeavours to arouse sleepy 
Christians to give universal satisfaction. 
It was while he was thus engaged that 
the writer of 'this sketch, then State Sun- 
day-school Missionary for Connecticut, be- 
came personally acquainted with him. 
Barton had organized a Sunday-school in 
a needy district, and, on being inquired of 
about it, wrote as follows concerning the 
people of the neighbourhood and his work 
in their behalf : — 

" There is a grog-shop among them, 
which they do not fail to patronize. They 
are not only intemperate, but thieving, as 
the minus quantity of the farmers' fowls 
in that region about Thanksgiving-time 



26 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

fully testified. Some of the children, I 
am told, never went into a church. Some 
of them told me that they never went to 
school a day in their lives. . . . This I 
thought was a good place for a Sunday- 
school : so I visited every family with 
that in view. . . . When I proposed the 
idea of a Sunday-school, they all seemed 
pleased. But when I sought the aid of 
those on whom I relied to assist me in 
carrying it on, then came ' the tug of war/ 
. . . They thought there was no use 
trying. ' There weren't children enough 
for a school/ ' The days were too short.' 
'They had enough to do Sundays already.' 
'They didn't want to take hold of any 
thing that would fall through on their 
hands.' 'The old meeting-house would 
be too cold for the children;' and so on, 
to the end of the chapter. 

" Well, put all these things together, it 



REV. JOHN W. BARTON. 27 

made it look rather dark ; but, it not being 
in the nature of your brother missionary 
to give up, he went ahead, trusting in the 
Lord. We organized under most encou- 
raging and surprisingly 'good prospects. 
There were present sixteen children, with 
a fair prospect of ten or a dozen more. 
Also the presence of a few good brothers 
and sisters, whom I had thought incorri- 
gible, showed that my pleadings with them 
and at the throne of grace had not been 
in vain. I wish you could have heard 
those children sing. You might perhaps 
have smiled at some of their discords ; but 
I told them I wanted them all, old and 
young, to open their mouths as wide as 
they could ; and they obeyed so exactly to 
the letter, that although some of the little 
fellows did get so fast on the chorus that 
the rest of us couldn't keep up with them, 
still the very discords did my heart good, 



28 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

for it showed they, were all trying. . . . 
The prospects of the school thus far are, 
I consider, very flattering. Surely the 
Lord is at work. Pray for us, brother." 

CANVASS OF WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS. 

Because of his fitness thus shown for 
the work of a Sunday-school missionary, 
Barton was commissioned in the spring 
of 1862, by the American Sunday-School 
Union, to undertake an exploration of 
Western Massachusetts. He entered on 
this work with heartiness, and was soon 
fully absorbed in its prosecution. The 
condition of some of the waste places of 
hill-towns and small factory settlements 
of his field, greatly surprised him, and 
drew out towards them his warmest sym- 
pathies, w T hile inducing his most earnest 
endeavours for their relief. His full re- 
ports of this exploration are replete with 



EEV. JOHN W. BAKTON. 29 

evidence of his profound interest in, and 
special fitness for, the work of evangeliza- 
tion, on which he had entered. 

"Oh, the destitution !" he wrote in his 
first letter. " There are upwards of five 
hundred children in this town, who go 
to school : of that number, by the most 
liberal calculation, there are never by all 
the churches as many as two hundred 
gathered into Sunday-school, thus leaving 
over three hundred children out. Of a 
population of more than sixteen hundred, 
never, on the pleasantest days, are there 
more than four hundred in all the churches, 
leaving a vast number at home or in the 
fields, desecrating the day." 

Of a town without church or Sunday- 
school, he wrote: "With the exception of 
four partly evangelical families, all the 
inhabitants are Universalists. I never 

dreamed of such a morally destitute place 
3* 



30 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

in New England, — and then in Massachu- 
setts, too. Only think of it!" And of 
other towns he added: "The state of re- 
ligion is very low. No male (with one 
exception) has here united with the Con- 
gregational church in some years. Scarce 
any are in the church under forty-five 
years of age. The Orthodox Congrega- 
tional church is here almost extinct, and 
orthodoxy is a term of reproach. But five 
such families are in the town." 

In these long-neglected neighbourhoods, 
Barton's interest did not expend itself in 
mere sympathy. Although the duty as- 
signed him was rather that of a prelimi- 
nary survey, with a view to future mis- 
sionary operations in that field, he per- 
formed important missionary work as he 
went along, and organized a number of 
new Sunday-schools in needy districts in 
rural and factory towns. 



REV. JOHN W. BARTON. 31 

NEW SUNDAY-SCHOOLS. THEIR GROWTH. 

Of this kind of labour he wrote, in one 
instance : — 

41 There is a district along the G 

river, where there is quite a population 
on both sides, in the two towns which the 
river separates. When there is a meet- 
ing in either school-house, the people of 
the other district always turn out; but 
they are so far from any church that but 
very few attend anywhere. Concluding 
they were in sad need of a Sunday-school, 
I visited those districts, going nearly from 
one end to the other of both of them, 
travelling about nine miles, making twenty- 
five calls, visiting both of the district 
schools and addressing the children, and 
holding a meeting in the evening, where. 
I trust, we started a school that will live. 
. . . Having talked to the children during 



32 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

the day in their schools, the little folks 
were all on tiptoe, wide awake. After 
my address I put the matter to vote; 
and every little hand went up, while their 
eyes sparkled with delight. May the 
Lord bless and succeed the enterprise I" 

Of his next Sabbath's visit to that school, 
he wrote: "We completed the organiza- 
tion, arranged them in classes, appointed 
teachers, and attended to all other matters 
requisite to getting it into good working- 
order. They are to have a good school 
there. They are all wide awake, young 
and old. There were forty-six scholars, 
six teachers, three officers, and four others, 
lookers-on, — fifty-nine in alL . . . Last Sab- 
bath I set the children at work to get a 
library. The people told me that it had 
been the most amusing week they had 
ever experienced. The little 'dunners' 
were around, thick and faithful. One 



BEV. JOHN W. BAKTON. 33 

family said that before they had finished 
their breakfast Monday morning, a little 
coloured girl called for some money for 
the library. It was distant about a mile 
and a half from her own home: so that 
she must have started early. Another 
little girl, whose parents had never trusted 
her away from home alone before, was 
around, saying to every one she came 
across, 'I got paper for some money.' The 
result was that yesterday they had col- 
lected five dollars and forty cents. They 
said they should make it up to ten dollars. 
One man advanced the ten dollars, and seve- 
ral said they were ready to give what the 
children did not get. But they will get it." 
A few weeks later, his further re- 
port was, "They have increased in 
numbers so much that they have been 
obliged to move into a hall, which, they 
told me, was full last Sunday. It holds 



34 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

about seventy-five. There seems to be, 
they say, some religious interest among 
them." Again he added,- " They are about 
to revive their Methodist class-meeting 
there. This through the influence of the 
Sunday-school. May the Lord pour out 
his Spirit there! It is just what they 
need." 

A second school was started by him 
in a factory village, before destitute, on 
the very Sabbath when he completed the 
organization of the one thus described; 
and three years later, when once more he 
visited the place, he found that it had not 
been intermitted meantime. 'During its 
first two years it was the only Sunday- 
school in town not " winter-killed ;" but 
after then its example stimulated other 
schools to keep open throughout the year. 
Its numbers had increased largely, until 
the school-house was too strait for it ; and 



EEV. JOHN W. BARTON. 35 

a new building was then being planned. 
A weekly prayer-meeting had been con- 
tinued since soon after the commencement 
of the school. The Holy Spirit had mani- 
fested his gracious presence there, and 
precious souls had been born to Jesus. 
Preaching was now secured, from one 
neighbouring minister or another, nearly 
every Sabbath evening. 

PREJUDICE ENCOUNTERED PROGRESS 

MADE. 

Describing further the details of his 
mission-work in a field where few would 
then have looked for ignorance or heathen- 
ism, he told of one man on whom he 
called to talk about a Sunday-school. 
u He listened a moment or so, and then 
interrupted me by saying that the first 
question was, 'How much is it going to 
cost ?' I told him that would not amount 



36 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

to much. He said he 'supposed if any 
one came there to teach, he would want 
pay for his services;' but I told him, 'no ; 
it would be a mission of love on his part/ ' 
"And again, when I was starting the Sun- 
day-school on G river, I came across 

one young man who said he thought a 
Sunday-school would be a first-rate thing 
for the children and others, but that 
he was 'too old a devil for it to do 
him any good." Of one, on whom he 
called for assistance, he said, "He, though 
a man of no religious principle (with per- 
haps the approximating exception of a 
sincere hatred to Universalism, of which 
the owner of the mill is a fair representa- 
tive), seemed to be desirous of having some- 
thing done for the children, and would do 
all he could to assist any one who would 
come there and labour." 

While starting new schools, Barton did 



KEV. JOHN W. BARTON. 37 

not neglect those already formed. He was 
constantly suggesting improvements in 
them, and introducing new measures for 
their advancement. " They strive with 
becoming zeal," he wrote of one school 
he visited, " to inspire the children, at the 
close of each session, with an interest, by 
some grand old super-long-metre tunes, 
applied to some of Watts's hymns. I find 
that they haven't introduced the Sunday- 
school music-books into this section. I 
urge the matter of singing wherever I 
go. There is another thing," he added, 
" that ought to be looked after, — the mat- 
ter of Sunday-school papers. They do not 
have them here to any extent." 

" They have Sunday-school concerts at 
the Centre/' he wrote, again, " which gene- 
rally call out large audiences. I find 
they make a sort of exhibition of their 
concerts about here. I haven't been pre- 



38 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

sent at one ; but I have learned by in- 
quiry. I don't like the idea, exactly. 
They ought to be instructed on this/ 7 
11 The Sunday-school here," he reported of 
another place, " follows the old, time-hon- 
oured custom of going into winter-quar- 
ters. They close in October, generally, 
and begin again about the middle of May, 
so as to have six or seven months to rest 
from the fatigue of their summer's cam- 
paign. I would like to spend a winter 
in this section, once, among these schools. 
I would show them how a winter-school 
would look." 

Through nearly the entire spring and 
summer of 1862, Barton laboured at this 
mission-work. He clambered over the 
hills, and made haste from point to point, 
in fair weather and storm, untiringly, and 
doubtless incautiously, — for he seemed 
bent only on present toil for the Master. 



BEV. JOHN W. BARTON. 39 

Doing all that lie could himself, he urged 
others to do the same in their several 
spheres of action. He consulted with 
pastors and other Christian workers, 
doing for them, in many instances, im- 
portant and gratefully acknowledged ser- 
vice. He secured local conventions of 
friends of the evangelization cause; and 
at these he obtained promises of special 
attention to needy districts which he 
pointed out. He prayed in homes where 
no prayer was wont to be made. He 
pointed to Jesus many little children who. 
had scarcely been told of the Redeemer 
before ; and he urged many neglectful 
parents to train their little ones for 
heaven. 

VALUE OF HIS WORK. 

If he had never done any thing else 
than what he performed in those earlier 



40 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

months of effort in Western Massachusetts, 
Barton's life had been a useful one ; for the 
results of his labours there are plainly ap- 
parent for good to-day. The facts which 
his canvass brought to light convinced 
many who had before been unwilling to 
believe there was in any part of New Eng- 
land need of special missionary effort, of the 
importance of greatly increased activity in 
the local churches, and among Christians 
generally, for the relief of existing destitu- 
tions; and, as a result, the home evan- 
gelization cause, in one form or another, 
was speeded wherever the influence of his 
work was felt. That movement, in Con- 
necticut and Massachusetts, always had 
his warmest sympathy. " I am rejoiced to 
hear," he wrote on one occasion to a friend 
in Connecticut, "that the 'Fogies' have 
not crushed out the 'Home Evangeliza- 
tion' movement, as some of them seemed 



REV. JOHN W. BARTON. # 41 

desirous of doing. It is the Lord's work, 
and he will ■ carry it on. . . . The world 
still moves, though much to the discom- 
fort of those whose dry bones rattle and 
crack at the bare thought of innovation. 7 ' 
» 

TRAVAIL OF SOUL FOR THE UNEVANGE- 
LIZED. 

Barton would have been continued as a 
permanent missionary in the Massachusetts 
field, but for his determination to pursue 
a theological course and enter the ministry, 
according to his early resolve. As it was, 
he made readv to leave in the month of 
August. His last work in Massachusetts, 
for that reason, was in one of the more 
destitute towns, on a certain Sabbath when 
the missionary superintendent, under whose 
immediate supervision he had entered the 
field, visited with a ministerial friend an- 
other barren spot, where Barton had been 

4* 



42 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

I 

doing preliminary work, to secure, if pos- 
sible, a Sunday-school organization. The 
letters which Barton wrote to his friend 
at that time showed his deep and fervent 
interest in the people among whom he had 
laboured. Planning for the co-operative 
movement, he wrote : — 

" I think I shall start about Wednesday 
(which is, I believe, about the time you 
start). Pray for me. May the Lord be 
with us both ! May the Lord speed us on 
our way and bless us in our mission !" 
After his return, but before he had learned 
the result of his friend's efforts, he wrote, 
again, "I feel that the Lord has good in 

store for M . I don't know that I was 

ever so deeply exercised over any thing as 
I have been over that place. I think of 
it much and frequently, and never without 
an earnest prayer in its behalf. I ago- 
nized at the throne of grace yesterday, 



EEV. JOHN W. BARTON. 43 

much of the day, for Bro. W. and you, — 
if you were there. I cannot but think 
you were there. I hope you were. At 
any rate, the Lord was there, and, I hope, 
to bless." When he received the letter 
which reported as a result of that visit 
a Sunday-school hopefully organized, he 
responded : " The letter was as gladly wel- 
comed as it had been anxiously waited 
for. How my heart has yearned over that 
place ! I prayed for you and the brethren 
there all day that Sunday, and the day 
before. I am rejoiced at the prospect of 
affairs. . . . The Lord was with you, 
truly. All praise and honour and glory 
be to his holy name!" 

YALE THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. 

In September, 1862, Barton entered 
Yale Theological Seminary; but he was 
not long contented there. He wanted to 



44 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

be more active in his Master's work. In- 
deed, before he had yet reached there, 
after leaving his Massachusetts field, he 
wrote to the friend who had directed his 
mission-labours, and who was about leav- 
ing home as an army chaplain : " So you 
are really going as chaplain? Well, the 
Lord go with you. It is a glorious field, — 
a place above all others to be coveted 
now, I think. If I was only fitted for 
the post, I couldn't rest easy a 'mo- 
ment till I got into it. I have felt for a 
day or two past as though I would like to 
be back among the hills of Massachusetts, 
at my old work among the Sunday-schools. 
But it becomes me to prepare the armour 
in which to fight future battles." A few 
weeks later, when fairly at his new studies, 
he wrote again : " My dear brother, you 
may be assured that I have not ceased to 
bear you on my heart to the throne of 



REV. JOHN W. BARTON. 45 

grace, that our Father would bless you 
and prosper you in your preparatory la- 
bours, speed you on your way, and 
strengthen you for your duties ; and that 
he would meet, encourage and aid you 
there, by a speedy and abundant outpour- 
ing of his Holy Spirit, so that you may be 
God's instrument in converting many souls. 
Oh, blessed work I Would I were prepared 
for, and in it ! Dear brother, pray for me ; 
for I fear and tremble sometimes lest I 
may here in the seminary grow cold, lose 
that nearness to God, that trust and confi- 
dence and feeling of dependence on him, 
that I enjoyed while in the work. I often 
long to be in the work again ; but I know 
lam not fit for it." 

Eev. M. T. Merwin, of Trumbull, Con- 
necticut, who was with Barton at the 
seminary, says of him, as to this restless- 
ness in inaction, " His whole soul was 



46 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

continually bent on doing good. I re- 
member, when at the Theological Semi- 
nary, pursuing for a while dry theological 
study, he could hardly reconcile himself to 
his position, so anxious was he to be at 
work instantly, saving souls. To keep 
his heart warm and be reaping present 
fruit in his Lord's vineyard, he would 
labour much outside of the seminary in 
the city, doing home-missionary and other 
religious work." 

In this view of his character, it is not 
surprising that he welcomed a new call 
to work for Christ among the children. 

MISSION WORK IN PENNSYLVANIA. 

In June, 1863, he was commissioned by 
the American Sunday-School Union to su- 
pervise their missionary work in the state 
of Pennsylvania. They were then doing 
but little to meet the destitutions of that 



REV. JOHN W. BARTON. 47 

commonwealth, having only a single mis- 
sionary there, and his labours did not 
extend beyond one county. The work 
thus put before Barton was vast, and he 
was young to assume its charge, being 
yet barely twenty-four years of age. At 
first he shrunk from its weighty respon- 
sibilities. "I am sadly perplexed, " he 
wrote to his friend Pelton, while con- 
sidering this call. " My heart, from the 
beginning, has said, ' Go/ My whole 
heart is in it. I love it. My great de- 
sire is to know what is best for the cause 
of Christ. My great fear is, if I decide 
according to my feelings it may be detri- 
mental to the best interests of Christ's 
kingdom. I am constantly beseeching 
God to show me." 

Yet Barton was already wisely ex- 
perienced, from his New England labours, 
in such effort as he was now called to ; 



48 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

and he finally decided to accept the trust. 
He prosecuted the work assigned him with 
system and diligence. Taking a Certain 
number of counties to begin with, he 
put a missionary in each, and directed 
these labourers in a thorough canvass of 
their respective fields, similar to that made 
by himself in the Massachusetts towns. 
The results of these investigations he 
tabulated carefully, and projected for each 
county a large map, showing the location 
of every Sunday-school and all neighbour- 
hoods where new schools were needed. 
By these maps and statistical tables he 
was enabled to bring the destitutions 
clearly before the churches he visited, 
and soon hearty co-operation and liberal 
support were secured to his compre- 
hensive plans, while he and his helpers 
were blessed in their untiring missionary 
endeavours. 



REV. JOHN W. BARTON. 49 

HOME HEATHENISM. 

After a year's work, he prepared for 
general circulation a valuable pamphlet, 
entitled " Sabbath-School Work in Penn- 
sylvania," in which he detailed the man- 
ner and results of his explorations and 
ministries. Referring to his canvass 
of five counties of the sixty-five in the 
state, he presented such startling facts as 
these : — 

" There are, you will observe, fifteen 
whole townships without a single Sabbath- 
school. Only think of it ! Fifteen entire 
townships in the old Keystone State where 
the children are unprovided with the 
gospel ! And in most instances where 
this is the case, the people are entirely 
destitute of the evangelical preaching of 
the word. If in five counties there are 
fifteen townships thus destitute, what 



50 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

must be the condition of the state as a 
whole? And these counties are by no 
means the worst ones in the state. In- 
deed, one of them is one of the very best 
counties, as regards its supply of Sabbath- 
schools. 

"But there are destitutions revealed by 
our explorations that cannot be expressed 
by figures. . . . Some of our cities and 
larger towns have Sunday-schools that 
cannot be surpassed in interest and effi- 
ciency by any in the land. But in not 
a few of the rural districts the. advocate 
of the Sunday-school is met by such silly 
objections as: They foster pride;' 'It is 
wicked to hold a school on the Sabbath ;' 
'They have no authority in Scripture 
whatever/ and, therefore, must be 'inven- 
tions of the devil. ' 

& ^: Jj: & # 

"I could mention not a few instances 



KEV. JOHN W. BARTON. 51 

that have come to my knowledge, where 
Sunday-schools have been broken up and 
driven out of churches and school-houses ; 
and this, too, among people professedly 
evangelical ! 

*Z* *£• •!• •$* *1* 

«J» »$• «J» wfm 5J» 

11 There is in one county a township 
where there are seven churches of dif- 
ferent denominations, five of which have 
no Sunday-schools. In fact, there is a 
county in which there are thirty evan- 
gelical churches without a single Sunday- 
school. 

•£• *** •£* *$» «&• 

•V* **> *f* *£* *T» 

11 There is a certain county in this state 
in the county town of which there is not 
a church of any kind. They have a feeble 
little Sunday-school of about thirty schol- 
ars ; and they enjoy the preaching of the 
gospel during a part of the year, once or 
twice a month, provided some good 



52 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

Methodist brother, aside from his other 
charges, has time to give them an occa- 
sional call. 

^ :J: # ^ sfc 

" There are schools which neither open 
nor close with prayer, and some where 
they do not even sing. . . . Many schools 
take no Sunday-school papers, and are 
poorly supplied with library-books. I 
remember one superintendent telling me 
that, by dint of hard labour, he managed 
to raise some two dollars in his neighbour- 
hood for the Sunday-school, and in the 
neighbouring village he increased it to 
five dollars, with a portion of which he 
proposed purchasing some Sunday-school 
papers. When the people heard of it, 
they came to him and told him that if he 
spent any of that money in getting Sun- 
day-school papers they would immediately 
take their children out of the school. One 



EEV. JOHN W. BAKTON. 53 

old, gray-headed man in that community 
boasted that he had never read a news- 
paper in his life. And this superintendent 
told me that not a newspaper, secular or 
religious, was taken there, except what he 
took." 

With such a presentation of facts, he 
added the forcible statements, " These 
figures need no comment. They speak 
for themselves. They furnish food for 
serious reflection to every patriot, Chris- 
tian and philanthropist in the state. Well 
'may the question be asked, How long 
shall we remain a Christian people, when 
considerably more than one-half of the 
rising generation are without the teach- 
ings of the gospel ?" 

Urging immediate efforts for the evan- 
gelization of the entire state, he said, "I 
am convinced that one of the very best 

means of doing this is by beginning with 
5* 



54 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

the young. 'Children/ as a modern 
writer quaintly remarks, 'are the visible 
elements of an invisible hereafter ; for the 
world will soon be the conclusion of which 
they are the premises/ Surely, as are 
the children of to-day so will be the world 
of to-morrow. If we would have the 
next generation a God-loving, God-fearing, 
God-serving people, the love, fear and 
service of God must be instilled into the 
minds of the youth of to-day. And the 
sooner we begin, the better/' 

County conventions were called, and 
county associations formed, to consider and 
provide for the disclosed necessities of their 
several fields, and the number of mission- 
aries under Mr. Barton's direction was 
steadily enlarged. For all this he was 
sincerely grateful, and to God he gave the 
praise. 

"This is a great, good work I have un- 



REV. JOHN W. BARTON. 55 

dertaken," he wrote. "The Lord is with 
me; but, oh, dear brother, do not cease to 
pray for me ; for I am very, very weak. 
In the Lord is my only hope and trust. 
If he has called me to this work, I know 
he will sustain me in it. Oh, pray for 
me." Again, he said: "It is beset with 
great difficulties ; but the Lord has in his 
goodness opened the way gradually. I 
think he has started me right. It is a 
great and glorious work. I only wish I 
was fitted for the responsible position I 
hold. But the Lord is able to fit me, — 
and he alone. Did he not call me, and 
will he not direct me?" 

RESULTS OF EFFORT. 

After sixteen months of missionary 
effort, Mr. Barton issued a second pamph- 
let on "The Future of Pennsylvania," in 
which he reported as follows of the work 



56 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

of himself and his assistants since he had 
entered that field : — 



New schools organized 


62 


Teachers in the same 


458 


Scholars 


2,247 


Schools visited and aided 


496 


Teachers in the same 


7,279 


Scholars .... 


. 48,523 


Families visited 


3,662 



The reports of his personal work from 
June, 1863, to December, 1864, as now 
preserved at the Society's rooms, show 10 
new Sunday-schools organized by him, 
with an aggregate of 442 scholars; 113 
other Sunday-schools visited and aided, 
and nearly 500 families visited in the line 
of his mission ; and this in addition to all 
his work of supervising the labours of 
others, and making available the material 
gathered by them. 

The society would gladly have con- 



EEV. JOHN W. BAKTON. 57 

tinued him in charge of this important 
work ; but he had a restless desire to re- 
sume his studies and yet enter the minis- 
try. Writing to his old classmate again, 
he said: "The experience of the past few 
years will be invaluable to me in the 
ministry ; for I have not by any means 
given up the ministry. I feel I was born 
to be a minister ; and a minister of the 
gospel I intend to be, unless the Lord 
by his providence keeps me in something 
else. If so, his will, not mine, be done. 
I shall always regard it as his will that I 
serve him in the ministry, until I receive 
unmistakable evidence otherwise. . . . 
I hope I am perfectly willing to abide the 
indications of his providence." 
■ About the first of January, 1865, he 
tendered his resignation. "I need not 
say," writes the Secretary of Missions, 
."how reluctantly we consented to accept it. 



58 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

To me personally it was a matter of great 
grief; for I had learned not only to trust 
but to love him. His earnest piety, his 
genial warmth, his perfect purity of cha- 
racter, endeared him to us all ; and the 
more we knew of him the better we loved 
him." 

Although Mr. Barton left the Pennsyl- 
vania field, the work commenced in it 
by him was neither abandoned nor inter- 
mitted. Labourers whom he set at work, 
or for whom he opened the way, have 
since organized many new schools and 
greatly improved others. In one county, 
the year after he left the state, a 
precious revival of God's work gathered 
hundreds of children from the newly- 
formed Sunday-schools into the fold of 
Jesus. Of these later results the Secre- 
tary of Missions writes, again: — " Brother 
Barton struck the key-note for Sunday- 



REV. JOHN W. BARTON. 59 

school missions in this state, and his works 
will follow him. ... I think the good 
which has since been accomplished in 
Pennsylvania can be largely traced to his 
wise inauguration of the system developed 
in the tract referred to [Sabbath-School 
Work in Pennsylvania]/ ' 

There are few of God's children privi- 
leged to accomplish more of g6od in a life- 
time than has been wrought through the 
well-directed labours of Mr. Barton in the 
state of Pennsylvania. Yet not all his 
record of successful effort was made up 
there. 

TIRELESS ACTIVITY FOR CHRIST. 

It was while he was considering the 
question of returning to his theological 
studies, and before he had yet left his 
Pennsylvania field, that he made a trip 
from his home in Reading to Boston, on 



60 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

Sunday-school business, during which he 
had occasion to show the spirit that was 
in him of unflinching determination to 
use his whole strength for the cause he 
loved. Leaving Philadelphia, November 
29, 1864, he reached New York in the 
evening, and was soon after seized with 
bleeding from the lungs. This was his 
first attack of hemorrhage. It alarmed 
him somewhat, and he sent for a physician ; 
but the next morning, feeling quite well, 
he resumed his journey. Being a little 
late for the train, he ran towards the depot 
of the New Haven Railroad, and in New 
Haven exerted himself, lifting a box of 
books. This disregard of himself was a 
consequence of his thorough absorption in 
the work he had in hand, and the little 
importance he gave to the bleeding when 
once it had ceased. 

December 1, he left New Haven for 



REV. JOHN W. BARTON. 61 

Boston, and while on the cars was again 
attacked with bleeding, and was troubled 
thus at intervals through the day and 
night. The next day he hurried about 
Boston, doing the work for which he 
came, and this while he was still spitting 
blood, so that those with whom he con- 
versed repeatedly urged him to go at 
once to his room and have a care for 
himself. But he seemed to feel then, as 
always, that his mission must be accom- 
plished at any cost. A physician who 
was called to see him urged his keeping 
quiet: yet he started for his home. He 
only reached New Haven, however; for 
he was very weak from illness and loss of 
blood. Much against his inclination, he 
there yielded to the injunction of a phy- 
sician and the entreaties of his friends, 
and decided to wait until after the Sabbath 
before resuming his journey. He tele- 

6 



62 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

graphed to his wife accordingly, without 
giving any reason for his change of plan ; 
but he grew so rapidly ill that early in the 
following week she was summoned to join 
him. It was while he was sick in New 
Haven that his resignation as superintend- 
ent of missions in Pennsylvania was for- 
warded to Philadelphia. He never re- 
sumed work there. 

NEW MISSION WOEK IN MASSACHUSETTS. 

During the winter of 1864-5, and the 
following spring, Mr. Barton sought health 
with more of patience and good judgment 
than he had shown at times of illness 
before: yet he constantly longed to be 
again at work. While passing a few 
weeks in the establishment of Dr. Dio 
Lewis, at Lexington, Mass., he became 
deeply interested in the religious condition 
of that famous town, so rich in its Pvevolu- 



EEV. JOHN W. BAKTON. 63 

tionary associations and memories, and his 
heart was stirred on finding that hardly 
more than one-tenth of the children there 
were under direct evangelical influences. 
What he saw and learned in Lexington, 
induced him to propose to the officers of 
the American Sunday-School Union, in 
the opening summer of 1865, to undertake 
a new and more complete canvass of West- 
ern Massachusetts, where he had laboured 
three years before. His proposition was 
favourably received ; and, with the co- 
operation of friends of the Sunday-school 
cause in and about Boston, and the added 
assistance of a few large-hearted workers 
and givers in Connecticut, he obtained a 
horse, and made necessary preparations for 
his new mission. By the middle of June, 
he was fairly at work, and wholly absorbed 
in his undertaking. He was more deter- 
mined to complete his canvass than to 



64 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

regard his health, — more energetic than 
prudent. 

TIRES OUT HIS HORSE. 

He recognized no duty of resting while 
he could by any effort perform toil. In- 
deed, his first respite was found not when 
he gave out, but when his horse was ex- 
hausted. 

"The tremendous hills and exceedingly 
rough roads of Western Massachusetts, " 
he wrote, Sept. 8, from Stratford, Conn., 
-• have used my pony rather hard, and 
worked off his flesh a little more than I 
like to see : so I have decided to give him 
a few days' rest, and, in the mean time, to 
spend a few days myself with my wife, 
who is here. ... I shall return to Massa- 
chusetts (D. V.) next Wednesday." 

Instead of returning, as he proposed, he 
was taken again severely ill, and confined 



EEV. JOHN W. BARTON. 65 

to his bed for several weeks. So soon as 
he rallied, he gave the utmost of his re- 
covered strength to the preparation of a 
full report of his extensive canvass. He 
directed the labours of a friend in the 
gathering of statistics from the few towns 
yet unreached of the field he had taken 
in charge; and, aided at his home by a 
patient, sympathizing, helpful wife, he 
toiled, week after week, in his sick-cham- 
ber, — one hour on his bed, in utter pros- 
tration, the next at his table, bending over 
the intricate mass of yet unarranged ma- 
terial, — until a valuable map of the can- 
vassed region was made ready, and the 
collected facts were systematically tabu- 
lated. With the opening year (1866), he 
forwarded to his superintendent the map 
and tables, with the sententious and ex- 
pressive announcement: " The statistics 
are finished, and /am — almost." 

6* 



66 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 



DISCL0SUKES BY THE MASSACHUSETTS 

CANVASS. , 

The canvass thus completed has pro- 
bably been rarely equalled, in its peculiar 
line, for a similar extent of country, in 
thoroughness, accuracy and the variety 
of its details. It remains an evidence of 
the energy and systematic habits of the 
untiring missionary who gathered and com- 
piled its material. The map shows the 
location of each church and Sunday-school 
in every town of the four counties. The 
statistical tables give the population ; the 
number of children and youth between 
five and fifteen years old ; of day-schools ; 
of Sunday-schools, evangelical and un- 
evangelical, with the teachers and scho- 
lars in each; and of Sunday-scholars 
under five or over fifteen years old, as 
well as those between such limits; the 



REV. JOHN W. BARTON. 67 

proportion of children and youth in and 
out of the Sunday-school; average Sun- 
day-school attendance; also, statistics as 
to teachers' meetings, monthly concerts, 
libraries, records, singing, papers, winter 
sessions, and attendance from neighbour- 
ing towns, — all arranged town and county 
wise. Nearly every town is fully described 
in its topographical, business, social and 
moral aspects, with accompanying notes 
on the condition of each parish, and the 
character of pastors or leading laymen, — 
not intended for the public eye, but for 
whoever should follow him in mission 
labour. 

A few extracts from these notes will 
show his keenness of observation, and 
indicate their value in such a prelimi- 
nary mission survey. Of course he found 
much of natural and moral beauty, of high 
culture, and of spiritual progress and at- 



68 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

tainment. One could hardly go amiss for 
such in Massachusetts. Hence his notes 
make frequent mention of bright-side 
items, as, — 

" Most of the congregation in the Sun- 
day-school." 

" Sunday-school very flourishing.' ' 

" A very commendable spirit of union 
among the different societies." 

" The pastor: a hearty, good- 

souled man; a good man to work with." 

11 The teachers spend an evening each 
week in the pastor's study, where he goes 
over the lesson thoroughly with them." 

" Mr. has been superintendent 

twelve years. Visits the classes in rota- 
tion, talks with them, and knows their 
spiritual condition. Good superintend- 
ent." 

But the purpose of the canvass was 
rather to show what yet needed attention, 



REV. JOHN W. BAKTON. 69 

than to furnish proof that much had been 
accomplished, and was yet being done, of 
good. Therefore special prominence was 
given in the report to waste places and 
obvious defects, indicating the desirable- 
ness of new schools and the necessity of. 
an improvement in old ones; and there 
was value in such notes as these : — 

"A factory village, where I think they 
ought to have a Sunday-school." 

"A good town for missionary labour." 

11 No church! No Sunday-school ! No 
store! No blacksmith- shop ! No post- 
office! ' No nothing' ! " 

" People who go to church at all go 

either to or to . But how 

about the people who have no means of 
conveyance, or not sufficient interest to 
ride five to eight miles to get the gospel?" 

"In this town none are rich, none are 
poor; but all are for making money." 



70 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

" The church has been candidating two 
years and four months. They now have 
a man in view.'' 1 

"Have no minister. They can pay 
about $600, and for that wish to get a 
$1000 man." 

" Superintendent did not seem to know 
any thing about his Sabbath-school/' 

" No record kept, and no one seemed to 
know anything about the school." 

" Superintendent was sitting down 
during school session, with nothing to do." 

" Has no singing, except once in a great 
while." 

" Just beginning to take an interest in 
singing; but, oh, how slowly they sing!" 

"I fear that the conversion of souls is 
not thought of." 

"At Sunday-school concert they recite 
pieces. Quite a common practice, I am 
sorry to see." 



BEV. JOHN W. BARTON. 71 

Frequently his whole comment on a 
district, a building, a religious organiza- 
tion, or an individual, was comprised in 
the simple quotation of its local sobriquet, 
or of the expressive remark evidently 
made to him about it by some one from 
whom he sought information. Thus, 
words would be wasted in giving a fuller 
description of a chapel that had been 
successively used by various denomina- 
tions, and seemingly to little purpose, 
than is covered by its mention as " The 
Slop-Bowl;" or of a church which spas- 
modically flashed out light and was lost 
again in darkness, as " The Lightning- 
Bug.' ' And each such quotation from 
his local informants, as the following, tells 
its own story: — 

"A great deal going on that ought not 
to be." 

" Kind of heathen/" 



72 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

" A kind of a Sunday-school. Organize 
as they go along." 

" Deacon pretended to superin- 
tend it. Didn't do much at it." 

1 ' Open the church when there are 
enough -there." 

" Great on singing." 

11 Smart as anybody's minister in these 
parts." 

"HIS WORKS DO FOLLOW HIM." 

Like his work in Pennsylvania, Mr. 
Barton's labours in Massachusetts proved 
of immense value even after his return 
from the field. The facts developed were 
many of them startling. Their subse- 
quent presentation to the churches aroused 
fresh consciousness of need and of respon- 
sibility ; and soon a faithful and efficient 
Sunday-school missionary was at work for 
the relief of destitutions brought to light 
in that garden-spot of favoured New Eng- 



REV. JOHN W. BARTON. 73 

land; while many local churches have 
since increased activity in their home- 
fields, and the Evangelization Committee 
of the Congregational Churches of the 
State are using advantageously a portion 
of the information secured through this 
exploration. When, finally, " the books 
are opened," in the Great Day, it will 
doubtless appear that many precious souls 
have been brought to Christ as a result 
of those latest missionary labours of young 
Barton in the New England field. 

ZEAL BEYOND STRENGTH. 

There was little else for the untiring 
worker to do here in the flesh. Most 
men in his state of health would have 
lain down to die, at once, on the com- 
pletion of such a work as the Massachu- 
setts canvass. But for him, with his zeal 
and strength of purpose, as long as there 

7 



74 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

was life there was labour. He would not 
yet give up hope of future usefulness, even 
while for a time entirely prostrate. But, 
with all his longing to do more, he seemed 
to understand that he had already done 
too much for prudence; and, in writing to 
a fellow- worker just then, he gave him this 
caution against over-exertion, in view of its 
sad consequences in his case : — " I am very 
much afraid, dear brother, that you are 
working too hard. I fear that if you keep 
on at this rate you will be of no more service 
to the Union, in a few years, than I am. 
I warn you, my dear fellow, that the feel- 
ings of a broken-down man, who has been 
engaged - in — and whose heart is still 
warmly interested in — a good work, are 
any thing but pleasant. To sit and see 
what should be done, and how it should 
be done, without the strength to do any 
thing, ... is very hard, I assure you." 



EEV. JOHN W. BARTON. 75 

i 
MINISTERIAL ORDINATION. 

So sanguine was he of yet other labours 
for souls, even while he was steadily sink- 
ing under the pressure of organic disease, 
that he sought the attainment of his long- 
cherished purpose, in ordination to the 
ministry, expressing the hope that he 
should yet do something in that new call- 
ing, although, as he admitted, " I presume 
it will seem a mere farce to many for me 
to be ordained, w r ith one foot in the grave 
with consumption." 
I May 22, 1866, he was ordained by an 
ecclesiastical council at Danbury, Conn. 
His friend Pelton was present to bear a 
part in the interesting exercises; and of 
these he writes : "I esteemed it a great 
privilege to give him the right hand of 
ministerial fellowship, — for that position 
he had for nearly twelve years hoped and 



76 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

longed to fill. I felt it was meet, and so 
said, that, as he had already proved him- 
self qualified for the work, he should 
receive that much-wished-for crowning. 
As I referred to his remark about the 
affair seeming to any a farce, and our 
hopes for his longer usefulness, the tears 
— unusual sight for him to weep — ran 
freely down his cheeks as I held his hand 
and suggested that, if it should be his to 
take his crown of faithfulness before us, 
it might also be his to give to us the right 
hand of welcome to the fellowship of the 
saints on high." 

In the month of July following, Barton 
said, in a letter to the friend who super- 
intended the New England mission work : 
" My object in writing at this time is to 
report myself, through you, to the old 
Union, as ready to resume the harness 
and to go to work in some capacity. I 



KEV. JOHN W. BARTON. 77 

do not mean by this that I am yet well ; 
but I am so much better that I begin to 
think of resuming labour again this fall, 
which is near at hand. You know my 
interest in the society, and my desire to 
serve it." And so restless was he in in- 
action that in September that friend was 
induced to find special service for him in 
Hartford, assisting in compiling the fig- 
ures of a new Sunday-school canvass of 
Connecticut. At this he worked with 
wonderful tenacity of purpose until the 
middle of October, when he left it only 
to make arrangements for more active and 
important labour at the head-quarters of 
the Union in Philadelphia, where he pro- 
posed to pass the winter. 

While his preparations for this winter 
work were in progress, he sank rapidly; 
and, during a visit to New York City, his 
family were telegraphed to, by a phy- 

7* 



78 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

sician's advice, and they hastened to his 
side. Yet even then he would not believe 
he was to die before he had done more 
work. He told his wife that the alarming 
summons had not been sent at his sug- 
gestion. And when he started homeward, 
on the morning of Wednesday, November 
21, 1866, he declined all assistance in 
putting on his outer coat and making other 
preparations for his journey. Then, taking 
his seat in the cars, he leaned his head 
forward on the seat before him, and dropped 
asleep, — to awake in glory. 

THE ACCOMPLISHED PUKPOSE. 

Five years before, John Wait Barton 
had said he only expected to see five 
years of effective service in Christ's cause, 
but that, God helping him, he would work 
while he lived, with the pleasant prospect 
of wearing out and dying in work for 



REV. JOHN W. BARTON. 79 

souls. Thenceforward he had lived in 
constant readiness for death, with no 
dread of its coming. Speaking warmly 
of Miss Priest's beautiful hymn, "Over 
the River, 5 ' in his last letter to Pelton, 
he objected only to her idea of the mes- 
senger from the other side. "There is no 
'boatman cold and pale,' " he said, "in the 
bright, silvery stream which separates me 
from my home above. I expect an angel 
to bear me across, amid sunshine and 
clouds of celestial beings. I think all 
other ideas are based on paganism." 

Surely God made ready His child for 
what was before him. Dying at twenty- 
seven, he lived a long and a useful life. 
Perhaps he might have lived longer had 
he been more prudent in the use of his 
wasting physical energies ; but his single- 
mindedness in activity for Christ, which 
made him wholly forgetful of self, is to 



80 SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF 

be admired and rejoiced over, even while 
those who would imitate him in this are 
cautioned not to be regardless, as was he, 
of the life and health which only can 
enable any to long serve the Master here. 

"I can truly say," writes Professor 
Northrop, his former teacher, "that a more 
self-sacrificing, devoted, humble Christian I 
have never known. I sometimes thought, 
as I noted the flush of his cheeks and 
the very great brightness of his eyes, as 
he recited to me in Danburv, that his 
years would not be many. But he has 
lived long enough to do much good, and 
his life has been in the highest degree a 
success." 

How few have at their start in life less 
advantages than were his for a career of 
extended usefulness ! How few, in living 
less than a score and a half of years, do 
more of good to many than did he, — the 



REV. JOHS W. BARTON. 81 

dependent orphan, who looked unto Jesus 
as the Author and Finisher of his faith 
and his works, and lived with an eye 
single to the glory of God and the good 
of souls. 

"The little, independent, boisterous, 
fun-loving, story-telling orphan boy of 
fifteen years," writes his friend Pelton, 
"so quickly developed into the cheerful 
but 'sober-minded' man, the faithful, zeal- 
ous worker, and the mature Christian ! 
The ambition for self so soon exchanged 
for desire for the glory of God in the sal- 
vation of souls, and its rich reward so soon 
obtained! It was 'grace, grace alone,' 
that wrought such happy changes ; and to 
God* through Christ, be all the praise! 

"God bless the Society whose earnest 
work he so loved, and those labourers who 
are bereaved in the removal of an efficient 
fellow- worker!" 



7t ° *%%: fr^j 

FALLING IN HARNESS. 




SKETCH OF THE LIFE 

OF 

EEV. JOHN W. BARTON. 

BY 

CHAPLAIN H. CLAY TKUMBULL. 



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